


on which to place it

by LittleBlackGoldfish



Series: distance as a measure of our growth [1]
Category: Impulse (TV 2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:40:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21879034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleBlackGoldfish/pseuds/LittleBlackGoldfish
Summary: Other things move on the world stage, silent hidden shapes, barely even shadows beneath the waves and things change. Events in Henry's life spiral out along different trajectories; some things heal and some things break in different ways, spalling off debris into ever widening ripples of change. But first, the start.Character/Relationship tags to be added as they become relevant.
Relationships: Henrietta "Henry" Coles & Jenna Hope
Series: distance as a measure of our growth [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1586440
Comments: 2
Kudos: 17





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Sort of a prologue to a series I started thinking about like a week before the second season came out. May, later include crossover elements (or at least later would be when they actually become apparent as more than passing easter eggs). With what i'm keeping quiet for the moment.

Her feet sink into dry mud the second she slips from the house to the park and the fact that she's not flat on her ass is an improvement over previous visits. Without having to struggle to her feet, or the steady downpour, it is remarkably quiet. Glancing around Henry searched for any sign of her dad; hoping more than expecting to find him looking down at her from the lip of the depression she kept ending up in.

Nothing.

Climbing her way out of the shallow pit Henry took a second look around the campground. 

Moonlight crept down to the forest floor through branches high above, casting her surroundings in soft gentle light. Old stumps, worn and patchy dirt trails, low shrubs that swayed in the slightest breeze. Ahead of her an expanse of dirt, stone ringed center stained faintly black by countless memories of campfires, marked only by metal cut out to read '21' with a tent symbol in front. But not a hint of anyone.

No long lost father creeping out of underbrush to sweep her up in his arms. Not even a taciturn, cranky, asshole of shitty mentor to chastise her for naivety.

Just silence and empty space.

"Dad!"

Something rustled. Just branches swaying in the wind.

"Dad, I'm here!"

Only the fading echo of Henry's own voice trailing off into nothing interrupted the distant owl calls.

Slowly edging forward, closer to the camp ground, Henry was drawn in by dim memory. The smell of marshmallow and wood smoke swam up, the feel of flashing heat from a crackling fire ghosted across her front, and the phantom warmth and weight of her dad, so much larger then, pressed against her. Picking out a spot on nearby log that looked the least rotted, Henry settled down to wait.

And waited.

And waited.

The sky darkened gradually as the moon slipped lower in the sky. As the shadows lengthened and deepened Henry's thoughts crept up on her and the gentle reminders of memory turned slowly into fantasy; her dad sweeping in behind her and lifting her to swing wildly around the campground, laughter tumbling freely from the both of them. Eventually they would settle and talk into the early dawn hours. And then they, both of them, hand in hand, would slip back to the Hope house and there would be Henry's mom, only half awake she would gape at them and then run forward and sweep them both in with a hug. Then…

Then, what?

Henry shook her head. She was hardly looking for a cozy white picket fence family life; her mom had Thomas now and she actually liked him and was willing to, like, talk about tough shit with him or whatever. He was good for her.

But. 

Maybe with her dad back, Henry's mom would be able to settle a little better. Especially once they could both explain to her about the whole teleporting thing and it would just be another screwed thing about Henry, but, like, an actual family thing.And her dad could teach her about all this shit, he'd kept himself free all this time so he had to know something Nikolai didn't. Or at least he would be willing to tell her about all the things Nikolai wasn't. And then her mom would know that he hadn't just run out on them.

That he'd been protecting them, her. Just like Henry was now.

Of course, Henry would explain that it wasn't necessary anymore, because whatever Nikolai had done would keep them off Henry's back and all three of them could be a family again.

It wouldn't be the same obvious, not like it was before. Henry wasn't ten anymore for one and she hardly expected them to be in love or anything, not with Thomas in the picture. They could be a family though.

Could be together, there for each other and shit. Whatever came next.

She just had to wait for him to show up.

The sky kept lightening, thin tendrils of dawn sneaking over the horizon and eating away at the paling night shadows still laying across the ground. Birds chirped. Tentatively at first, but with growing frequency and energy. 

And Henry's gnawing excitement turned into something else. Halfway between grief and rage, it was a cold ugly thing that settled in the pit of her stomach and curdled. She started pacing around campsite in search of something, anything, nothing in particular. Soon enough the familiar burn of anger fills her.

Everything she'd done for this moment, this chance, and he couldn't even show. What the fuck was even the point of those glimpses, the clues he left, if it wasn't so that they could actually meet; all the lying and hiding she'd done and he didn't even show up. 

How the fuck was she supposed to explain any of this to her mom without him? To make sense of any of it? She doesn't know anything about how this works, so how is Henry supposed to keep her mom safe and figure it out. Nikolai was ready to let her mom  _ die _ . Henry can't trust him, not when it comes to her mom and the rest of her life that's why she needed her dad the one person who actually knew something about any of this that she could trust.

Fuck. Lucas is in jail right now to buy her time. No one is going to believe he killed his own fucking father for long, not when he was off, like, discovering religion or something. 

The prick they replaced Anna with wasn't letting the case go. Bill Boone had been too rich, too much of a 'community leader,' for that, no he'd keep picking at it and sooner or later the whole fucking thing collapse on her head. People weren't going to buy Clay had done it for long.

Henry was screwed. All because her fucking dad couldn't be bothered to show up the one goddamn time she needed him too. 

Fuck.

*

*

Slipping to back ho- back to the Hopes' house, was easy. Henry trudged back of cold earth. Her thoughts slipped between maudlin and raging, Henry almost knocked on Jenna's door before her brain caught up with her body.

Jenna was gone and she didn't want to hear anymore of Henry's shit. 

That thought sent a cold knife through her gut. Jenna didn't want to see her, just like her own dad apparently; well then, fuck them both, she didn't need either of them. Thing could finally go back to normal, just her and her mom. Maybe the next town would be better.

It could hardly be worse than all the shit that'd happened to her in Reston. So yeah, fuck Reston. And fuck the Hopes. 

She took the stairs quietly, her mom should still be sleeping, up to her room. Her room. She stared at it and blank walls stare back, she thought it'd be like a new start, a blank canvas. Instead it just felt like a prediction.

Maybe she knew this was coming, the inevitable end to something too good to be true; Henry and her mom were never built for a normal family. Better the open road and a new home, a new horizon, every few months. Sticking around too long only ended up suffocating them, stifling that vital part of them that kept them going. So, maybe it was better that it happened now, before Thomas tried to make it official or anything and tie her mom down or anything. He and Jenna were never going to be their family.

Not really.

A clean break was better.

This wasn't ever their home, not really, however close it came to feeling like it. 

*

*

Henry tapped uncertainly at the cool metal surface the table. They'd finished packing up all their stuff into the car that morning, but her mom had insisted she go to school rather than helping her move it. Not that there was much to move, most of their lives could fit into a handful of boxes, a pair of backpacks, and one oversized suitcase. It was easier that way.

Her mom had also been cagey about where they were moving too, insisting that she'd show Henry after school.

Of course school was about the last thing she planned on doing. Maybe her mom hadn't settled on a destination yet, but Henry was sure it wouldn't be long now. A few days at most, then they, she, would see the last of Reston.

Across from her Lucas sat down heavily, like there was an extra weight pressing down on him and stared at her for a moment.

"Henry," he said. "What are you doing here?"

"You have to take it back, like recant or whatever."

He stared at her, uncomprehendingly, shook his head, "I'm not doing that. This is where I belong."

Of course he wasn't going to make it easy for her, none of the Boones had ever seemed to give a shit about what she actually wanted. Jenna was wrong, Henry had only wanted Lucas to say he'd like seen his dad or something, this was so far from what she'd asked him to do it wasn't even funny. And all that angel shit he was spouting, God, maybe he was really off his rocker. She didn't need to be dealing with any of this.

"If anyone deserves to be in here, it's me. I'm the one who killed your dad."

He shook his head again, "Maybe you pulled the trigger, but my dad practically killed himself, Henry. The things he, we- I did, neither of us were good men. This is where I belong, trust me."

She knew you weren't supposed to, like, challenge someone's delusions, but Henry couldn't stop herself, "Look whatever it is you think I am, you have to know, I'm not some perfect- you called me an angel, but that's not me, I'm just a messed up girl trying to unfuck her life. So, just take it back and..."

"Tell them I threatened you or something, threatened your brother," shuddered at the thought. Something cold and angry and sad flashed across Lucas's face. "And then I'll- I'll tell them it was me and, and-" 

And what, go to jail? 

Henry didn't exactly think she'd do well in juvie. Of course she'd killed a guy so they might just toss her in a real prison. Fuck, what was her mom going to think. Or the cops. How the fuck was she supposed explain what had happened to either of them, how she'd killed him in the first place or gotten rid of his body afterward. 

Was she going to tell the she got the gun away from Bill? All six feet and two-hundred something pounds of him? Nikolai wasn't exactly around to back her up. Not that he would have.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

And what if that brought Nikolai's bosses back down on her. They'd apparently spent decades looking for people like her and were scary enough that her dad wasn't willing to risk showing up in the middle of a forest in the middle of the night for his only daughter. Maybe it was better for Lucas to take the fall-

For killing his own dad. Fucking shit. Was Jenna right? Did Henry just use people?

"No," Lucas said.

His voice, so certain and sudden drew Henry sharply out of her thoughts.

"Lucas…" 

"I'm not- angels are supposed to be good, right?" Henry continued, before he had a chance to interrupt again. "Well I'm not. Definitely not perfect, probably not even good. Everyone I- I hurt people who care about me, put them in danger."

Suddenly his hands were on hers, a warm contrast to the cool metal, "I don't think you're perfect. I'm not that fucking crazy, besides that's not what an angel is. They're...messengers, instruments, servants. Going out into the world to bring things back in tune with God's will; sometimes that's messy, dangerous."

"I've been where you were before, lost and hopeless and alone."

"And at first I didn't understand either," he pulled her hands towards him, cupped between both of his. Henry resisted the urge to pull it away. "I thought my life was over. Besides a shitty mechanic, a so-so drug dealer, and a worse brother I didn't have anything to offer the world; but I learned that the Lord has plans for us all."

"I- I'm not, I mean I can't even- fuck, it's all so messed up and I don't know what to do."

Still cradling her hands in his, Lucas nodded and small smile. Almost shy.

"His voice isn't always easy to hear, the world is noisy. I almost fell back into bad habits, listening to the wrong things. But when I finally listened, really listened, to what He was saying I knew what I had to do. That's why I came back, to face everything I'd done; all the people I'd hurt, the pain I caused, to make amends. And that led me back to you."

"Here." He tapped the table.

"Where I was meant to be," now his eyes took on a gleam. The same he'd had that night outside the dance and just like then it frightened her. 

"God has a plan for you too, Henry, you just need to be ready to see it."

"How would- how did you know?" Religion had never figured much in Henry's life. She'd never even seen the inside of a church, or anything else for that matter, and it had never really appealed to her, all that trusting in other people and other things to take care of shit. Henry didn't trust like that.

But.

Lucas' certainty, dripping off his every word like pure rainwater, was tempting. What would it be like to believe that strongly in something, to be able to trust that someone or something else would have her back when it came down to it? She wanted very much to feel that for herself.

"Don't worry Henry. You just have to have a little faith, you'll know when God opens your path for you. But, really, you shouldn't be here," looking over his shoulder. "You gotta go."

He turned to signal the guard that had brought him in and stood with the next motion. She let him go for a moment, lost in the swirling eddy of her own thoughts and uncertainty. God hadn't even spoken to her, how the hell was she supposed to 'hear him' or make herself ready to 'see it.' 

"Wait- Lucas, just-"

"Just, remember that doing what's right… it isn't always what's easy," he said and before she could come up with anything in response, anything to make him stay and explain things to her, he was gone. Following the guard back behind the thick metal doors that lead deeper into the prison.

Henry stared after him.

*

*

When she got home-

Home. Even trying to think of the little ground floor apartment her mom had somehow managed to get them as home freaked Henry the fuck out. Because the things is? It's not.

Her and her mom in the car, and the road slipping past the windows as they moved from one town to the next; leaving behind nothing more than another bad breakup and a blurring collection of names and faces for Henry to forget. That was the closest to home she'd ever had. Just her and her mom circling each other warily, tethered to each other.

Until Reston. 

Thomas Hope and his bowling alley and his inability to fix a transmission. And Jenna.

Now, home was a loft bedroom and the barn just outside her window. The long expanse of empty, fallow, fields. Creaky stairs and the room down and across, painted soft blue, and covered in the accumulated junk of sixteen years of life. Henry's heart seized uncomfortably, thinking of Jenna sitting in that room.

Every part of her felt sick. Her stomach churned and twisted, settling into a cold leaden ball of just pure awfulness that simply sat there like dead weight. Something prickled at the back of her eyes, Henry tried to breathe evenly and only managed a choking shudder.Everything was so completely fucked. And it was her fault, like, if she had just come up with some other way of shutting Jenna up besides opening her stupid fucking mouth it all could have kept going. 

But she hadn't.

Which wasn't a surprise, Thinking things through had never been Henry's strength. She acted first and only rarely considered other options after and sometimes the things she chose in the moment managed not to be total disasters, but basically never because they were good choices.

And so, rather than the loft and the room below all that Henry has is her mom and this apartment. Bought with money sent to them by a guy who knows things about her life even she doesn't, who's bosses apparently scared her dad so bad he couldn't even show up for her even after months of passing encounters and dropped clues. A man Henry hasn't seen or spoken to in days.

He might be dead for all she knows.

This isn't her home, no matter how hard her mom tries to make it. Henry thinks she's probably fucked up the only good chance at that she ever had.

How's she supposed to make a home when the only person she actuallys gives a shit about, besides Townes and her mom, fucking hates her. What, Is she supposed to go to school for two years with Jenna glaring at her, their entire relationship down to icy silences and sullen resentment. Sounds real peachy.

For the first time in, basically ever, it's Henry who wants to run from a place and her mom who's setting down roots and trying to dig in or whatever. That's so fucked up it's actually kind of funny. 

Maybe it would have been better if she'd just said yes to Josh when he'd asked her to go with him. The river, the house, the town, snowboarding, and fly fishing had all sounded pretty nice then, nicer now. henry thinks she could make a home out of all that. Burrow deep into a place where no one knows anything about her, where people don't whisper about her and Clay Boone, where they won't remember a girl running down the street with blood on her hands. A place without Jenna, walking around like a raw wound shouting out all her worst sins. Some place her mom wasn't kidnapped and shot on the same day.

She could do that, just wrap herself in a new life and come out, like, changed or something. Henry likes the sound of that. Before she even really means it, she has her phone out in her hand and she's scrolling through her contacts and then her finger is hovering over his name.

"Dinner's ready," her mom doesn't shout. The kitchen is barely a foot away from the bedroom.

Still the sound of her voice startles Henry and when they meet eyes, hers are wide and wild with panic. Is she really doing this? Leaving her mom, alone, in Reston just like that? 

"Henry?" she asks, stepping forward with wary uncertainty. "Are you alright?"

"Y-yeah," she manages. 

A new pain springs up in her chest, guilt and fear intermingling as she wonders which would hurt her mom worse; Henry leaving or finding out how long she's been lying.

"Just, thinking."

She manages a smile, tight and brittle, and though her mom doesn't relax she does nod. Things are still too raw between them, too tentative, for real honesty most of the time. It's not even entirely a lie. Henry brushes by and takes one of the two chairs that came with the apartment and settles in for dinner, just as lost as ever.


	2. Chapter 2

The thought creeps back in throughout the next day. 

It would be easy. 

Or, not exactly easy, but simple. She still doesn't have her car back properly, and what little money she has probably isn't enough to get her from upstate New York to Montana. That's before she even gets into whether he ever actually ended up going.

Or if Josh would even want to see her still. 

Part of her feels a bit shitty. Like, it's pretty fucked that she's only thinking of following him because her entire life in Reston is so completely trashed and she can't see a way out of it. But it's not like she wasn't tempted all those months ago when Josh sprung the idea on her, she was. Henry just thought it was better to stick around, not to do the quintessential Coles thing and run away from all her problems.

That hardly sounded like the sort of thing Lucas was talking about.

Of course, dude is in fucking jail and he's seems pretty convinced Henry herself is some sort of angel sent by god. Even if maybe he's not being as literal about that as she first thought. Whatever. He could hardly claim to be any sort of authority on good choices, but then again Henry doesn't exactly have a lot of better ones to turn to and the only reason he's in jail anyways is to protect her because she killed his dad. So maybe he knows a thing or two about having a fucked up life.

Still the thought follows her from class to class and through lunch, day after day, a constant niggling notion that distracts her from school and homework and Townes' babbling. Henry thinks she does a passable job of keeping up her side of their conversations that he hasn't caught on.

"Do you want a ride home?" he asks as they're leaving school. 

Her bike is still trashed and she doesn't have the money to get it repaired, or the time, the nearest bike shop is actually a town over. She's been walking these days. Luckily the apartment is closer than the Hope's was, which is a silver lining to the whole crap cloud that is her life if Henry's ever heard one.

"Nah Townes, I'm just gonna walk," She shakes her head. "But thanks."

Ever since the whole 'better as friends than sidekick and superhero' conversation she's been making an effort to keep her shit from invading their whole deal. Again another thing Henry thinks she's done a decent job so far.

"Is this," Townes dropped his voice low, glancing around at the other kids milling about before stepping closer. "Is it about your dad?"

Turns out she's wrong on that front. Okay, so she slipped a bit, but bitching about your parents, or just parent in this case, has got to fall in the realm of normal stuff to talk to your friend about.

"Because you know, I still thinks it's most likely that he just-"

"No, it's not," she says, cutting him before he can offer whatever theory he's cooked up. He means well, Henry knows, but it's the furthest thing from helpful. "It's just- I'm trying to spend more time with my mom. Like, bond and shit."

Townes smiles and nods. She feels bad for the lie.

"Okay."

"I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Yes," he nods vigorously and heads towards his car.

Henry breathes out, relieved and give him a brief wave as she weaves across the parking lot. As she gets to the sidewalk she sees Anna Hulce standing next to a black sedan across the street from the school, talking with another woman. Despite being almost a head shorter than the former sheriff she somehow manages to catch sight of Henry over Anna's shoulder; it's only a momentary glance, but that one look is so cooly analytical that Henry actually feels a shiver run down her spine. 

The other woman says a handful of words.

Anna looks over her shoulder and their eyes meet and they stare at each other for a long moment. Whatever answer she gives is quick, because a second later she's crossing the street.

She stops a few feet from Henry, sets one foot on the lip of the sidewalk, "Henry."

"Sheriff."

That gets a rueful smirk and a chuckle, "Not anymore. Look, Henry, I just wanted to-"

"Who's your friend?" she cuts in, lifts her chin sharply at the sedan behind Anna. The other woman, having apparently lost interest, scans the street with a long sweeping gaze that seems to catalogue and dismiss everything she finds.

"Thats- " Anna starts, looks back, finishes, biting down on something more, "An opportunity. You know, I still want to help you."

"What? Like," Henry laughs. "With my homework or something? Cause I don't think the new sheriff would like you poking around his town, trying to dig up stuff." 

Anna shakes of her head, "No."

"I understand feeling in over your head, Henry, even before-" her head twitches, like Anna wants to glance behind her again. "Believe me, I get it. I just want you to know, that whatever it is, that you're struggling with, I'm here. To talk, or just listen. To help. Whatever you need."

"Okay," Henry says.

What the hell else is she supposed to say to that. 

Literally nothing has changed in her life that would make her tell Anna Hulce, recently fired as sheriff, anything more than she already has. Really it's for her own good, because even though Nikolai has disappeared on her, Henry still doesn't trust him or his bosses not to, like, go after the Anna again. And if they don't think basically upending her entire life will do it, well Henry has plenty of reason to think killing her isn't off the table.

She doesn't want that on her head. Bad enough the people she's already dragged into her mess, Jenna and Townes and her mom, she's not looking to screw up any more. Plus, it's not like she can do anything. One woman against some fuckoff rich corporation with probably enough money and laywers to laugh off a murder charge, if they couldn't just make a body disappear. 

Which Henry knows they can do. 

Yeah, that's not a smart fight to pick, so why even let her know it's one she can?

"Okay," Anna sighs after a long moment. "Well, I'm leaving Reston. So this is probably the last you'll ever see of me."

" 'Cause of your," Henry motion pointedly over the other woman's shoulder. "Opportunity?"

"Yeah," she catches herself. "No. I was leaving anyways, that just made it easier."

The way her shoulders tense, that might not be completely true. Henry doesn't press, it's not her business. She doesn't want it to be, with Anna gone, that's one less worry on her shoulders; by all appearances the new Sheriff wants to bury the Bill Boone case as deeply and as quickly as he can. He doesn't seem very much bothered as to how.

Whole situation is fucked.

Because it means Lucas will definitely stay in jail. Her gut still twists at the thought and part of her does want to walk down to the Sheriff's office and confess it all, luckily that little bit of her is usually quickly beaten down by the other parts of her that don't want to get locked up.

"Just… take care of yourself Henry."

Something about the edge to Anna's voice, the finality of it, sets Henry on edge. Like a hint of things moving just out of sight, looming shadows of a monster passing beneath her, like she's missed something else going on, that unsettles her. Enough that the words come tumbling out of her mouth before she means them too.

"You're- are you okay?"

Anna smiles tightly. Glances over her shoulder at the other woman still standing by the car across the street, like one of those creepy mechanical presidents they're supposed to have down in Disney World or Disney Land. Looks back at Henry. Nods.

"I'll be alright," she says. "For a while now, I was looking for something; answers to questions- well, you don't really need to know."

"Oh."

There's a long moment where Anna watches Henry searchingly before giving another nod and turning to walk away.

"Um," Henry says before she's gone more than a few feet. 

"I'm sorry you got fired. You were a way better sheriff than this new asshole."

Anna chuckles and gives one finally muttered 'thanks' before turning away again. Henry watches her leave. The other woman says something as she nears, impossible for Henry to make out at this distance, and Anna nods, her shoulders tensing momentarily before relaxing. Circling around the car to get to the passenger side, Anna gives Henry a last wave and climbs in.

Seconds later the car is pulling away and moments after that roaring down the street and disappearing around the bend. And that's the last Henry sees of Anna Hulce for a long time.

*

*

Things settle down after that. Henry settles into a routine; she goes to school, committed just to making it through the year at first, and goes home each day. On the days that Jenna eats lunch in the cafeteria, surrounded by Patty and… okay so Henry doesn't actually know the rest of their names, but the rest of that circle, Henry eats her own lunch with Townes outside. Or without him.

Sometimes she'll go to the bleachers on her own, together they usually end up settling down at the outside tables. Henry knows that it's actually a pretty big step for him to be so flexible. 

Mostly she listens to him talk about whatever has caught his interest recently. Robotics, astronomy, a new show. Zoe. Henry tells him how her mom is doing, tells him the stupid shit she sees people doing in her other classes. Once she gets another job, at a gas station, because she got fired from  _ Surf N' Pizza _ , she tells him about the most interesting people she sees coming through town. 

What she carefully avoids is talking to him about Nikolai, still MIA, or the couple of times she slips away in her sleep to end up in increasingly familiar locations. Henry really tries not to think about any of that stuff herself actually.

She feels a bit bad sometimes when she thinks about leaving him, he's a good friend and he doesn't deserve her keeping even more shit from him. But he'd only try and talk her out of it if he knew. Henry doesn't dare skip town right away. For one she's not eighteen yet, meaning if the cops pick her up she'd only end up being dragged back. The plan, what little of it Henry has already worked out in advance, is to wait until she turns eighteen, until she's officially an adult and then make a clean break. Leave a note explaining just enough so her mom won't worry.

Too much at least. 

Then catch a bus, or drive if she's got her car back by then, to Montana and find Josh. As far as life plans go Henry knows it's not much, but it's the best she's got.

Her finger has hovered over the call button half a dozen times, but Henry figures it's better to ask forgiveness than permission from him and if he's not where he's supposed to be... well. Henry would rather not know that in advance. 

So she keeps the entire scheme locked up tight in her head, not so much as giving anyone a hint of it. And in the meantime she keeps to her routine; school, home, work, repeat. Slowly the apartment fills up with proper furniture, bought cheap, sometimes right off the roadside, and the other various amenities of a properly settled home. It still feels weird to Henry.

They, she and her mom, have never stayed in a single town this long since she was ten. It's weird enough actually spending Thanksgiving and Christmas just the two of them, but then the new year passes and she heads back to school and people actually talk to her. People besides Townes.

A guy in her english lit class asks her something about an upcoming essay and she regurgitates what she remembers. Really, it's a tiny thing, but it's weird because Henry is used to most kids in her classes ignoring her after the first couple of months. Not that she's never had friends, usually she manages to scope out some flavor of variously 'alt' scene and insert herself at least enough to score weed and shit like that. But now it's girls in her precalc class asking her about trigonometry shit and people shouting at her across the parking lot at the end of the day.

None of them are exactly what she'd call close and honestly Henry wants to keep it that way, the last time she actually let someone in it didn't go so well, but they still know her. They talk to her.

It helps a bit, to distract from the steady drumbeat of silence coming from Jenna. They haven't exchanged so much as a word in over two months by the time they come back to school from the holidays. Which is, like whatever, from Henry's perspective. She can't exactly complain about it because it's her fault and shit, or whatever. Even though Jenna was absolutely pushing her, blaming her for all that shit that wasn't about her and shouting shit that she really-

Whatever. It's not worth dwelling on most of the time. Henry knows it's not going to change so why bother.

Winter turns to spring and then school lets out and Henry has the summer free, mostly, sort of. Her mom wants them to spend like every free minute that neither of them is working hanging out, or finding some way to make their shitty little apartment more of a 'home,' so they ending up driving around a lot to antiques stores scattered in the towns around Reston. 

Two hours a week of just the two of them pouring through the most bizarre of upstate New York's cast offs.

Don't end up buying half of it.

Still, things have slowly begin to accumulate. Little eclectic bits of personality that make the apartment seem less like a place two people are just staying in and almost like something a family lives in.

Henry tries not to be there as much as possible, but with Townes as basically the entirety of her social life there's only so much she can actually manage that without freaking her mom out. She doesn't want leaving to be any harder than it has to be.

Gradually, the days start growing shorter again and the temperature steadily drops day by day. Going back to school is weird twice over. One because Henry has never actually gone back to a school over the summer, if they haven't had to skip town before the school year is out they usually have to over the summer. So usually 'going back to school' is actually 'finding herself at a new school.' 

The other thing is…

Well, it's the other thing. 

Jenna. During the summer it got easy to ignore the aching gap in her world, to drown it out with music or work or Townes. But the now familiar walls of Reston High, the echoing conversations and the clanging of lockers, do nothing but pound in Jenna's absence until Henry aches to the core. Three months of only distant fleeting glimpses have apparently not washed away that pain and in fact Henry finds it harder somehow to distract herself from it.

As much as she buries it under homework and music and the falling chill of autumn, it creeps back up every time she sees Jenna in the halls. Or hears her voice in class. 

It ends two months into the year.

For no reason. Jenna walks up to her between classes, settles in quietly next to her, leaning against the locker next to Henry's without even actually looking at her. She's not too proud to admit she stares, too afraid to say anything but also too afraid to let the moment pass.

Jenna saves her the effort.

"Patty keeps point out every senior or junior girl with hair cut higher than her shoulders."

"Which is sweet, I know," she adds. "But... I don't know. Megan said she really found her people at Colgate, and… I don't know, I don't want to risk, like, whatever neanderthals Reston still has freaking out."

Henry just watches her, unsure of what to say. A twitch goes up Jenna's jaw. White shows around her knuckles where grip too tightly to her own elbow, tension pour off her in waves and Henry knows straight away that the next thing that comes out of her mouth is critical.

An apology threatens at the tip of her tongue, but she swallows it down. She does the same with a half dozen other responses that flicker across her mind in those first seconds, too sweet and out of character to be anything like what Jenna wants from her. When she opens her mouth she can still feel the 'sorries' fighting to get out and she almost lets them the second time, but something in the way Jenna's eyes flicker to her mouth and the lines of her forehead crease tells her it would break whatever is happening.

So, instead what she says is-

"Just… tell her to fuck off."

Jenna's whole body goes loose and the barest flicker of a smile curls at the corner of her lips. And somehow, that's that. Things are still awkward, too many things staying unsaid, but Henry no longer feels like someone has an icy fist jammed into her chest half the time.

Besides, Henry's good with letting all that shit slide. Put all that fucked up shit behind them and just, be for whatever time they have left together. 

**Author's Note:**

> So this is goes AU sometime before Anna Hulce shows up in the Hope barn the night Henry goes to 'meet' her dad. You can assume most facts from the season remain the same, just different things happen because... uh, something else happened. What exactly change may not show up immediately. Or ever be apparent. I have about 30k words written, but pretty much none of that covers the actual potential crossover or divergence beyond taking place in its aftermath.


End file.
